^& 



m H3 



Revised to September, 1909. 



STATE OF NEW HAMPSHIRE. 

Department of Public Instruction, 



SUPERVISION. 



PROGRESS OF DISTRICT SUPERVISION. 

The general court of 1899 spread on the statute books^ 
a provision for professional supervision of districts com- 
posed of two or more towns. By the provisions of the act 
the state would pay one half the salary of such district 
superintendent, the other half to be apportioned amongst 
the towns forming the supervisory district, or union. The 
superintendent must hold a permanent state teacher's cer^ 
tificate, and he must devote his whole time to the super- 
vision of schools. 

In its far reaching effects, and its promise of still greater 
effects, the statute has been exceeded by very few, if any^ 
in the whole history of our school legislation. 

EARLY ADOPTIONS AND EARLY DISTRICTS. 

The law was made a matter of local option so far as the 
supervisory feature was concerned. It must be adopted 
by the district meeting before combinations with other dis- 
tricts could be made. 

The act became law in the spring of 1899, too late for 
the insertion of the appropriate article in the warrants for 
most of the district meetings and too late for the necessary 
explanation to the voters in the several districts. 

By the spring of 1900, however, a considerable number 
of towns had acted favorably, but they were so scattered 



A 









for the most part as to make it difficult, and in some eases 
impossible, to effect combinations of towns. Nine of these 
very towns still remain with votes on their records author- 
izing the employment of superintendents, but, owing 
largely to remoteness from other towns taking similar 
action, none of them has yet been brought within a super- 
visory union. 

In that year, 1900, three unions were formed, as follows : 

1. Marlborough, Troy, Fitzwilliam. 

2. Newmarket, Durham, Alton. 

3. Salem, Hampstead, Fremont. 

DIFFICTJLTIES IN ORGANIZATION. 

Difficulties in organization have been chiefly the follow- 
ing. Many of them still persist, but for the most part 
they are growing less year by year : 

(a) Lack of compactness. The sporadic character of 
the adoptions before mentioned made it necessary to unite 
towns which were not adjacent and often separated by con- 
siderable distances. Though an obstacle to smooth work- 
ing, this fact has never proved an insuperable obstacle, 
and towns so situated have usually by force of example 
brought in neighboring towns with which they could more 
conveniently combine. 

(b) Unsuitable superintendents. Although most of the 
school boards have chosen wisely, so that the state has been 
peculiarly fortunate in the men who have served as dis- 
trict superintendents, there have been some instances in 
which the superintendents have been unsuited by tempera- 
ment, by immaturity in judgment, or by lack of force of 
character for the peculiar needs of their calling. Of course 
such men will occasionally be selected. The true remedy 
would be to try it again with a better man. Unfortunately 



D. OF 0. 

MAR 5 1910 



^ a few towns have confounded the man with the system and 

'-; have promptly rescinded. 

^ Fortunately these cases have become rare. 

'S (c) Time needed for adjustment of superintendents to 

their work. Ten years ago district supervision was a new 
thing in this state. It has taken time for superintendents 
to become familiar with their problems, both as individuals 
and as a class. Year by year, however, experience has 
been accumulating, that experience has been made com- 
mon property by confereiii^es of superintendents, mistakes 
are fewer and the superintendent's activities more definite 
and effective. 

(d) Time needed for school hoards to learn how to use 
the superintendent. Some school boards in the beginning 
looked upon the superintendent as an interloper. They 
would interfere with and hamper him and sometimes posi- 
tively negative his acts as fast as he took them. Other 
school boards felt awkward and uncertain of their position 
and their relation to their superintendent. Both these dif- 
ficulties were natural and perhaps inevitable. Latterly, 
school boards are prevailingly coming to get used to their 
legitimate function as boards of directors or trustees ; they 
are learning how to map out work for the superintendent, 
and learning how to leave him alone to accomplish results, 
which is his chief function. 

(e) Time needed for teachers to get used to the visits 
of the superintendent. In the beginning many teachers 
looked upon the superintendent as an enemy, set up to 
persecute them. This feeling has so far disappeared that 
it is the rare exception that a competent teacher does not 
prefer to work under a superintendent. 

These have been the chief difficulties in securing smooth 
and effective working of the districts when once organized. 
It is on the whole surprising that they have proven of so 



little final importance. Of the one hundred and twelve cit- 
ies and toivns which have at one time or another been under 
supervinon eighteen 07ily have rescinded their votes arid five 
of these have since reconsidered and are now under super- 
vision. 

OBSTACLES TO ADOPTION. 

The chief obstacle to the extension of supervision has 
been of course the failure of district meetings to adopt the 
•article. The obstacles in the way of such adoption have 
been chiefly the following: 

(a) Inertia. This has been by far the greatest obstacle. 
Let well enough alone ; don't embark on any new venture ; 
what was good enough for the fathers is good enough for 
the children. This inertia has found its ready expression 
in a motion " To pass the article," without discussion, a 
motion which nearly always prevails. 

(b) Lack of understanding. A new venture needs much 
explaining. The voters, long accustomed to doing without 
a superintendent, could not understand his use. " What 
is the need of a superintendent?" has been and still is the 
expression of this lack of understanding. Such people are 
not hostile ; they only wait to be convinced. It is signifi- 
cant that wherever the proposition of the state has been 
explained to a representative audience, favorable action at 
the following school meeting has seldom failed ; and there 
is but one case on record when the matter has been 
explained at the meeting itself by a representative of the 
state, the voters being present, in which the district has 
failed to take favorable action. 

(c) Misu7ider standing. "It is a sacrifice of local con- 
trol." Of course this is not so at all. The superintendent 
is given no powers, with the express purpose that he shall 
be under the full control of the school board and the dis- 



trict. This is sometimes an obstacle to efficient work on bis 
part, but it compels him to win the confidence of school 
board and people. It also matches the responsibility of 
local self-government to its powers. 

" It will be a burdensome expense." As a matter of fact 
the cost of a superintendent is seldom as much as that of 
an extra teacher, and in many instances he saves his salary 
outright through better care of text-books and other ap- 
paratus. In the long run supervision always more than 
pays for itself by giving better results for the money ex- 
pended. AVhere the state pays one half the salary and the 
other half is divided between three or four districts, man- 
ifestly the cost to any one district cannot be great. 

(d) The magnifying of petty obstacles. Of course the 
plan is not perfection, and if we wait for everything to be 
perfection in this world before acting, we shall make little 
progress. 

(e) ''''It all depends upon the man.^^ Manifestly, but 
this is not reason for rejection. Every kind of action de- 
pends for its success upon those who act. The true prin- 
ciple is. If you don't succeed with the first man, give it a 
fair trial with another. 

(f) " It has been tried and proven a failure.^' Up to 
date, it has been tried by one hundred and twelve cities 
and towns, and eighteen of these had rescinded. Of that 
eighteen five have since reconsidered their rescission and 
are now under supervision. It must be remembered, too, 
that rescission has usually been carried by only a small 
margin. Four other towns have dropped out by action of 
their school boards. Five others have been forced out by 
the breaking up of the combination to which they be- 
longed. Hence, while but twenty-two districts altogether 
have tried supervision, for one reason or another dropped 
out, and still remain out, eighty-nine, have tried it and 
still remain. 



Furthermore, while the system has been working out in 
New Hampshire, both Main.e and Vermont have adopted 
similar laws. 

(g) " Could fit see results where it has been tried.''^ 
Very likely. Perhaps the objector does not know where to 
look for results. Again, it takes more than one year or 
yet two years to produce the best results. 

(h) " Thei/ jnay need a superintendent in the cities^ 
hut we do not need one in the smaller toivnsr That is 
equivalent to asserting that the children in the smaller 
towns do not need as good schools as do the children of the 
cities. 

RECENT PROGRESS. 

(a) In adoptions. During the first four years after the 
passage of the law, thirty districts were brought under su- 
pervision, eight of which for one cause or another dropped 
out. During the following six years, five of the dropped 
towns have been recovered and eighty-six others have been 
added. Of the last, eighteen have dropped out or been 
forced out. 

(b) A better class of superintendents. Demand has cre- 
ated a supply and a better class of men are obtainable as 
superintendents. 

(c) Better understanding of work. School boards, su- 
perintendents and teachers have better learned how to 
work together. 

(d) Aivakening of public opinion. Successful super- 
vision in one town has awakened interest in other towns, 
not only in supervision as a method of securing good 
schools, but, what is more important, in good schools them- 
selves. If the reader will take a map of the state, he will 
see that the towns under supervision lie in nearly continu- 
ous lines or in bunches, showing that supervision in one 
town has usually commended itself to the people of adja- 
cent towns. 



Cities and towns under supervision : 

Allenstown, 

Alton, 

Amherst, 



Antrim, 

Ashland, Special, 

Atkinson, 

Bath, Town, 

Bath, Special, 

Belmont, 

Berlin, 

*Boscawen, Special, 

Campton, 

Charlestown, 

Chichester, 

Claremoni, 

Colebrook, Town, 

Colebrook, Special, 

Columbia, 

Concord, Town, 

Concord, Union, 

Concord, Penacook, 

Conway, . 

Danville, 

Derry, Town, 

Derry, Special, 

Dover, 

Dublin,^ 

Durham, 

Errol, 

Fitzwilliam, 

Franklin, 

Greenland, 



Hampstead, 

Haverhill, 

Woodsville, 

Hill, 

Hillsborough, Town, 

Hillsborough, Special, 

Hinsdale, 

Holderness, 

Hopkinton, 

Hudson, 

Jaffrey, 

Keene, 

Laconia, 

Langdon, 

Lebanon, Town, 

Lebanon, High School, 

Lebanon, West, 

Loudon, 

Madison, 

Manchester, 

Meredith, Town, 

Meredith, Special, 

Milford, 

Milton, 

Nashua, 

New London, 

Newington, 

Newport, 

Northfield, 

North Hampton, 

Northumberland, 

Ossipee, 



*Boscawen Special has united with Penacook as one distiict. 



8 

Peterborough, Til ton, Town, 

Pittsfield, Tilton, Union, 

Plainfield, Troy, 

Portsmouth, Tuft on borough, 

Raymond, Wakefield, 

Rindge, Walpole, 

Rochester, Warner, 

Rumney, Westmoreland, 

Salem, Wilton, 

Somersworth, Windham, 

Stratford, Wolfeboro, 

Swanzey, Woodstock. 
Tamworth, 

Towns formerly under supervision which have with- 
drawn by rescissions : 

Alstead, Henniker, 

Danbury, Newmarket, 

Enfield, Orford, 

Farmington, Stratham, 

Franconia, Sunapee, 

Fremont, Warren. 
Hanover, Town, 

Towns formerly under supervision which have with- 
drawn by action of school board : 

Bradford, Rye? 

Marlborough, Winchester. 

Towns formerly under supervision which have been 
forced out by action of neighbors: 

Epping, ■ Pierinont, 

Harrisville, Pembroke. 
Littleton, 



9 

Towns which first tried supervision, then rescended, 
then came back and continue under supervision: 

Alton, Langdon, 

Hampstead, Somersworth. 

Hudson, 

PROGRESS IN OTHER STATES. 

The New Hampshire law as it stands was enacted with 
the experience of Massachusetts alone as a guide. It was 
probably an improvement on the then existing Massa- 
chusetts law and the latter was subsequently modified 
materially. Toward the close of the decade which has 
elapsed since 1899, both Maine and Vermont have 
adopted laws which are in essential particulars better 
than ours, and New York is about to adopt an act similar 
to that of Vermont. 

In Massachusetts, the enabling act authorizing towns to 
combine for the purpose of supervision was passed in 
1888. By 1900, 96 per cent, of all the children of the 
state were residing in cities or towns under professional 
supervision. In that year supervision was made compul- 
sory upon all towns and cities of the state, the same to 
take effect in 1902. 

The state pays $1,250 toward the superintendent's sal- 
ary, which is fixed at |1,500 as a minimum. 

It is said by the Massachusetts State Board of Educa- 
tion, that during the period of twelve years which elapsed 
between the enabling act and the compulsory act, there 
was scarcely an obstacle conceivable which was not pro- 
posed by the ingenious opponent. " The law was a scheme 
to provide college graduates with employment ; it was an 
unwarrantable interference with local self-government; 
it would afflict the state with a horde of crack-brained 
theories ; it would, in short, be a perfect Pandora's box of 



10 

evil spirits." Still the towns went steadily on adopting 
until nearly the whole state was under supervision by local 
option. During the eight years which have passed since 
supervision became universal, there has been scarcely a 
breath of opposition. It has made teaching vastly more 
effective ; it has made schools vastly better adapted to the 
communities which they were primarily designed to serve ; 
it has greatly improved attendance conditions. It has re- 
sulted in a great improvement in the comfort and hygienic 
conditions of the schoolhouses. 

It is doubtless true that the Massachusetts towns which 
had to divide but 1250 of the superintendent's salary 
amongst themselves were much more willing to adopt than 
New Hampshire towns which have had to share one half 
the superintendent's salary among themselves, or -1750 on 
the same basis as that of Massachusetts. 

The Maine supervisory law has recently been remodeled, 
so that it corresponds more closely with the New Hampshire 
law. The essential features of the Maine law which are 
different from that of New Hampshire are : supervisory 
unions must continue three years unless sooner dissolved 
by a two-thirds vote of the joint committee ; the state pays 
two thirds of the salary of the superintendent up to the ex- 
tent of -1800. In practice, the salaries of our superinten- 
dents being what they are, this feature is not very differ- 
ent from that of New Hampshire. Under the Maine law, 
however, in the last three years about thirty supervisory 
unions have been established. The state superintendent of 
Maine informs me that the advantages are sufficiently ob- 
vious to Maine towns to make adoptions almost entirely 
spontaneous, and that the state has been embarrassed by 
the rapidity of the formation of districts rather than other- 
wise. 

The Vermont supervisory law was remodeled by the leg- 
islature of 1906. The Vermont statute is a distinct step 



11 



in advance. The supervisory unions can be formed by 
action of the several school boards without any action by 
the district. Unions cannot be dissolved until three years 
from the date of formation, except by a two-thirds vote 
of the joint committee. The state pays ^11,000 of the su- 
perintendent's salary. The minimum salary is il,250. 
The superintendent has certain statutory duties such as 
the prescription of the course of study, the purchase and 
distribution of all books and supplies, and the dismissal 
of teachers for cause. The rapidity of the adoptions in 
Vermont is due, doubtless, mainly to two factors : first, 
the large proportion of the salary paid by the state ; and 
second, the fact that no action by the district meeting is 
required. 

WHAT DISTRICT SUPERVISION IS ACCOMPLISHING. 

In the first place it should be understood that district 
supervision does not purport to be a method of revolu- 
tionizing schools and accomplishing the marvelous. The 
professional schoolman has occasionally appeared upon the 
scene who has proposed with much flourish of trumpet to 
produce the system of public schools which would usher 
in the millennium. Such men have usually been profes- 
sionally short-lived in any community, and have almost 
invariably done much more harm than good. 

On the other hand, it cannot be claimed that, in the 
twelve years during which district supervision has been an 
established policy of the state, it has accomplished any 
revolution. It has been rather working a steady and pa- 
tient improvement in the results produced by the schools 
as they are. It has had very formidable obstacles to over- 
come, extending all the way from the prejudice of the 
public to hopeless incompetency of teachers. In the main, 
it has surmounted them all and, in my judgment, has jus- 
tified itself by its fruits. 



12 

I. It has accomplished a distinct improvement in the 
regularity of the attendance of children at school. No 
matter how good or how poor your school may be, it can- 
not accomplish its purpose unless the attendance of chil- 
dren is regular. Practically every district superintendent 
has begun his career by patiently working at this problem. 
In fifteen towns which were among the earliest under 
supervision, the average percentage of attendance for two 
years preceding the coming of the superintendent was 86.5. 
In the same towns during the school years, 1906-1908, the 
average percentage of attendance was 90, making a gain of 
3.5 points in 100. The average gain for the state during 
the same period was 1.4. It should be understood at the 
same time that the actual improvement in this item is 
really much greater than the figures show. The prevailing 
tendency of the teacher who is without supervision is to 
keep her register in such a way that the percentage of at- 
tendance shows up to be much higher than it really is. 
One of the first steps of the district superintendent has 
been to see that the register is correctly kept, and this step 
in most cases results in a lowering of the figures. Hence, 
the improvement noted above is really considerable less 
than the true improvement, since the lower of the two 
figures in comparison is higher than it should properly be. 

II. The district superintendent has in the great ma- 
jority of cases succeeded in cleansing and otherwise bet- 
tering schoolhouse conditions. In a very large number of 
instances he found one-room schoolhouses, and even larger 
buildings, suffering from the neglect and the accumulated 
dirt of years. He contrived to see that the buildings were 
renovated at the outset and afterwards kept clean. 

He often has found that the moral conditions about the 
schoolhouse were deplorably bad. In a patient but vigor- 
ous and persistent campaign for moral decency and clean- 



13 

liness, he and his teachers in cooperation have often 
achieved wonders. 

In many instances he has succeeded in interesting the 
teachers, children and school board in the whitewash- 
ing, tinting and decorating of schoolhouse walls, so that 
the room has been changed from a barn to a dwelling 
place. 

The writer has in mind at this moment, two schools which 
illustrate the above. 

The first case is that of a small village schoolhouse. 
I visited this school personally about a year and a half 
prior to the coming of the superintendent. It was grossly 
unsanitary, grossly unclean and overcrowded to about three 
times its normal capacity with the youngest children. I 
have no doubt that that schoolhouse had been directly re- 
sponsible for the deaths of many children. The next time 
I visited this school, not quite one year after the super- 
intendent's arrival, I found it clean, wholesome, still 
somewhat overcrowded, in charge of two teachers (there 
had been but one before) whose teaching was correct and 
whose school management was sound and wholesome. To- 
day, the schools of that whole community have been housed 
in a modern school building at a cost of over f 25, 000. The 
superintendent is very far from having been entirely re- 
sponsible for this improved condition of affairs. District 
supervision, however, and this superintendent in particu- 
lar, do deserve much credit, for it was through them that 
the first necessary steps were taken. 

The other case was that of a small school in a one-room 
rural schoolhouse in a back town. Prior to the superin- 
tendent's coming this and all other schools in town were 
in the typical condition of neglect. The building was com- 
paratively new and, at bottom, perhaps as good as a build- 
ing might reasonably be expected to be. It was, however, 



14 

dirty and in many respects indecent. The teaching was a 
farce. Within six months after the superintendent's com- 
ing an intelligent high school graduate was teaching, and 
learning daily from the superintendent how to teach better. 
The schoolhouse was sweet and clean inside and every trace 
of indecency had been removed. 

Cases similar to the above might be repeated for nearly 
every supervisory union which has been formed. 

III. In many instances the superintendent has effected 
economies in the financial side of the administration of the 
schools, not infrequently, if the reports of school boards 
are to be credited, saving the town's entire portion of the 
salary outright. Amongst other directions in which su- 
perintendents have effected such savings have been the 
following : 

In the purchase of text-books and supplies the superin- 
tendent is ordinarily much more conversant with the needs 
of the schools and with the most advantageous placing of 
orders than the average school board member is likely to 
be. What is bought is, therefore, bought usually at a lower 
price when the superintendent is consulted. 

An efficient superintendent usually succeeds in gather- 
ing up a censiderable stock of text-books, paper, pencils, 
etc., which have been laid away in the closets of different 
schoolhouses and forgotten. One case is on record in which 
the district superintendent within a month of his arrival 
saved -$50 on an order for text-books and supplies in this 
way. 

The most needed lines of text-books are the cheapest. 
The school board is prone to invest heavily in frequent 
changes of expensive books which are not needed. After 
consultation with the district superintendent they com- 
monly purchase the more needed, but less expensive line 
of books. In towns which are under good superintendents 



15 

there is also a tendency to use fewer text-books and to 
depend more upon teaching. 

In towns in which school boards rely upon the superin- 
tendent's judgment, I find that there has been a notable 
decrease in the habit of purchasing expensive but useless 
pieces of apparatus, so prevailing a few years ago. It has 
been not an uncommon occurrence for a school board mem- 
ber, overpersuaded by a glib agent, to pay an extravagant 
sum for some patent apparatus for the use of the schools, 
which, in the great majority of cases, never comes to any 
educational use whatever. Professional schoolmen can 
rarely be persuaded either to purchase or to recommend 
such apparatus. The apparatus really needed for school- 
rooms is inexpensive, but seldom found. 

In this day of free text-books and free supplies, there 
is often a lamentable waste through the neglect of teachers 
and children, neglect of the care of books and waste of 
other supplies. The effect is doubly disastrous for it is 
not only an extravagant use of money, but also tends to 
develop in children the very opposite of those habits of 
thrift and respect for public property which they should 
learn in school. 

In general, the district superintendent accomplishes very 
considerable savings in expenditure of school money 
through his special knowledge of values and through his 
ability to look after details, or, what amounts to the same 
thing, he saves money which is non-productive and makes 
it productive. His ability to save, however, of course, de- 
pends on : first, whether or not the school board is willing 
to consult him; and second, whether or not the schools 
have previously been conducted on economical or parsi- 
monious lines. Generally speaking, school boards do con- 
sult the superintendent concerning all strictly educational 
expenditures, although there are some notable exceptions 



16 

to this rule. In some cases they make him their financial, 
as well as educational, executive. In case the previous ad- 
ministration of the schools has been really economical, of 
course there is no room for any saving ; and in case the 
previous management of the schools has been parsimonious, 
there will, of course, be an increase in expenditure if there 
are to be any good schools. 

Another economy resulting from the employment of a 
superintendent, while not strictly financial, resolves itself 
into terms of money in the end. I refer to the great sav- 
ing made by increasing the regularity of attendance. It 
appears that, although there has been a general improve- 
ment in regularity of attendance in all schools, yet in 
those towns which have adopted the supervisory plan the 
increased regularity of attendance is more than double the 
increase for the state as a whole. In the fifteen towns 
first placed under supervision, there has been an improve- 
ment in attendance of 3.5 points on a scale of 100. The 
average for the state is 1.4 points on a scale of 100. In a 
town having a membership of 100 pupils at an average 
school year of thirty weeks, this is equivalent to a financial 
saving of $47.25. In the specific case of one town which 
went under supervision in 1904, the average attendance 
has been raised from 80 per cent, to 93 percent. This in- 
crease is equivalent to a saving of f 253.11, or rather is 
equivalent on this one point alone to getting 1253.11 more 
value out of the same investment, and the cases could be 
multiplied. The proportion of the superintendent's sal- 
ary paid by the town just referred to, is 1195. It is cer- 
tainly not worth while to maintain schools at all unless the 
children attend regularly. Unless they do so, we do not 
begin to get our money's worth out of our investment in 
schools. It is good business to add a little more and thus 
get the full return on our money. 



17 

IV. Of course the principal benefit derived from dis- 
trict supervision, in its value far transcending all others, 
centers around the teaching itself. Unfortunately we can- 
not express this benefit in dollars and cents nor in any 
other numerical form. While the improvement in the re- 
sults of a schoolroom are not usually immediately apparent, 
and are seldom apparent to the casual observer even within 
a year, as time goes on and the process of systematizing 
the work and training teachers to do the work is not 
broken, the results become very manifest in : (1) a con- 
spicuous mental awakening in the pupils ; and (2) dis- 
tinctly improved scholarship. Such improvements have 
been especially marked in reading, arithmetic, the use of 
good English and geography. 

Reading. In towns not under supervision, with here and 
there an exception, the process of teaching children to read 
consists chiefly in teaching them to pronounce words. It 
is not uncommon in such schools to ask a ten-year-old boy 
what he has been reading and to find that he answers only 
with a vacant stare, evidently failing utterly to see that 
the question has any point. The superintendents have 
been advised and urged to make this subject the initial 
point in their campaign for improvement, for upon read- 
ing depends absolutely the whole superstructure of edu- 
cation. And with but few exceptions the superintendents 
have almost at once succeeded, in most schools, in getting 
some real reading done, beginning with the smallest chil- 
dren. 

Their usefulness here is particularly manifest in those 
towns which are obliged to employ as teachers persons en- 
tirely without any professional preparation. The teach- 
ing of reading is, beyond all other teaching, usually that 
about which such persons are most ignorant. They are 
not to blame. In most cases they are worth all the money 



18 

they receive. With no superintendent on the ground, 
they proceed in the teacliing of this very important sub- 
ject as best they can, and their best is usually simply the 
training of children to pronounce words. In a very brief 
time a capable superintendent can show a teacher of this 
sort enough about the principles of the teaching of read- 
ing to enable her to achieve very satisfactory results. 

Arithmetic. Under the guidance of superintendents 
there has been a marked recovery of mental arithmetic 
from its long period of disuse ; there has been a marked 
tendency to cut down the ridiculously large number of 
useless topics to the dimensions of the fundamental and 
useful portions of the science with consequent gains in the 
direction of thoroughness. Many teachers, particularly 
untrained teachers, have been led to reduce the emphasis 
upon dollars-and-cents arithmetic to its proper dimen- 
sions and to emphasize the solution of practical problems 
chosen from the daily life of the pupil. 

English. The aim of superintendents in the very im- 
portant matter of the cultivation in children of the power 
of using their mother-tongue intelligently, has been along 
the lines of a more rational and, consequently, more thor- 
ough teaching of spelling ; of the training of children in 
the use of language by actual oral and written composi- 
tion ; of the divesting of the study of English grammar of 
its meaningless formalism on the one hand and its imprac- 
.ticable substitutes on the other. 

Geography. In most places the district superintendents- 
have found the teaching of geography a matter of assign- 
ing certain paragraphs, longer or shorter, to be memor- 
ized verbatim, followed by the subsequent repetition by 
the teacher of questions from the foot of the page or the 
end of the chapter. Of necessity, under such method, the 
outcome is merely an unrelated jargon of the names of 



19 

capitals, mountain chains, capes and peninsulas without 
the remotest idea that there is such a thing as tlie under- 
standing through the study of geography of the earth as 
the dwelling place of man. 

The superintendents are working a change in this mat- 
ter in the direction of the study of geography as a science 
of reality. Instead of learning to recite a catalogue of 
names, the pupils study first their own home town and its 
surroundings, its chief industries, etc. Proceeding from 
a real knowledge of their own surroundings, they are better 
equpped to study in a similar way and to understand the 
life, the industries, the institutions of other lands. 

I have dwelt upon these four common school subjects 
not because the district superintendents have limited their 
attention to these and in full realization of the fact that 
individual superintendents have devoted more attention 
to other subjects. I mention them because they have been 
the main lines through which the superintendents have 
aimed to secure more efficient teaching ; because in them 
the superintendents have perhaps secured their best re- 
sults ; and because they best illustrate the general spirit 
of the superintendent's work so far as it has to deal with 
teaching itself. That spirit may perhaps be properly sum- 
marized as an effort to bring life into the schoolroom and 
drive bookishness, as such, out ; to make schoolroom work 
deal with realities and to produce mental growth and ca- 
pacity in children, rather than a pleasing fund of in- 
formation. 

V. Discipline. The effect of supervision has been dis- 
tinctly to improve the condition of discipline in the schools. 
In fact, in one or two cases in which towns have dropped 
out of supervision temporarily, there has been such a 
prompt recrudescence into the old ways of misbehavior 
that the townspeople have come to realize sharply, as they 



20 

probably otherwise would not have done, the value of the 
presence of a superintendent in town for this cause alone. 
The improvement is probably to be accredited chiefly to 
the following factors : 

District supervision brings back into the schools some- 
thing of the virile element which used to be a distinguish- 
ing mark and which seems to be about as necessary in the 
maintenance of permanently good discipline as do army, 
navy and police forces for the guaranty of law and order 
in society. A turbulent boy is apt to think twice if he 
knows that a man will be on hand tomorrow, or day after 
tomorrow, or next week even, to deal with him. On the 
other hand, the presence of the superintendent in the 
schools is some guaranty of an understanding of the boy- 
life of the town from a boy's point of view. 

Most superintendents are able to counsel teachers effect- 
ively in the direction of a more wholesome school manage- 
ment. Much the same process is now taking place in the 
supervisory districts in this respect which has come very 
nearly to completion in the cities. In the modern village 
and city school the problem of discipline is well-nigh negli- 
gible as compared with what it was twenty-five years 
ago, — a result which has been brought about in the main 
by the effective introduction of more rational principles 
of school management. 

The district superintendent from his peculiar position 
makes an excellent arbitrator, — provided he is of the right 
personal temperament. He holds a position midway be- 
tween the school board and the teacher which gives him 
an excellent opportunity to nip in the bud those incipient 
quarrels between teachers and parents which are so often 
the bane of all effective school work. He is thus able to 
bring parents and teachers to a better understanding ; to 
deal with parents dispassionately, causing them to see the 



21 

acts of their children in a light which the teacher could 
not possibly throw upon them ; and in this and in mani- 
fold other ways to prevent all but the most serious mat- 
ters being brought before the school board for final ad- 
judication and settlement. 

VI. Finally, not the least of the benefits of supervision 
has been the upbuilding of a better educational spirit in 
the community, a spirit of increasing interest in schools 
and a spirit of increasing broad-mindedness toward school 
matters. It has had a tendency to prevent the sometimes 
bitter contentions of the different warring cliques in town. 
The writer has more than one case in mind, in which 
three- or even five-cornered fights were always to be 
expected upon every school question which came up, where 
the advent of the superintendent, without any particular 
action upon his part, has had the effect of transferring 
the battle-field to other than educational interests. 

It should not be understood that this record of achieve- 
ment is universal. On the contrary, there have been some 
cases in which the superintendent has proved so ill-adapted 
to his work, or the school board has been so entirely un- 
willing to allow him to accomplish anything, or the peo- 
ple have been so hostile to the whole notion, that the 
schools have been hampered rather than helped. Such 
cases have been extremely few. 

In general, the superintendent has succeeded in greatly 
increasing the ratio of scholastic achievement in the pupils 
to money invested in schools. 



22 



TABLE No. 49. 

Summary of Adoptions of Supervision in New 
Hampshire, with Present Salaries of Super- 
intendents, AND Amounts Paid for Latter by 
Towns and the State, Corrected to September, 
1909. 



Yearc 
adoptio: 

1855 


)f Town or 
n. city. 

Manchester, 

Nashua, 

Concord, 

Dover, 

Portsmouth, 

Keene, 

Laconia, 

Rochester, 

Somersworth,! 

Franklin, 

Penacook, 

Durham, 

Hampstead,! 

Fremont,* 

Marlborough,* 

Fitz William, 

Newmarket,* 

Salem, f 

Troy, ^ 

Dublin, 

Epping,* 

Pembroke,* 

Pittsfield, 

Alstead,* 

Alton,! 

Hudson,! 


Amount paid 
by town. 

12,300.00 

2,000.00 

2,000.00 

2,000.00 

1,700.00 

1,300.00 

1,300.00 

1,200.00 

1,050.00 

1,300.00 

450.00 

225.00 

150.00 


Amount 
paid by 
state. 


1869 




1874 




1881 




1885 




1889 




1894 








1897 




1900 






1450.00 
225.00 
150.00 










172.50 


172.50 


1901 


270.00 
172.50 
145.84 


270.00 
172.50 
145.84 








1902 


325.00 


325.00 




300.00 
216.00 


300.00 
216.00 



23 



Year of Town or 
adoption. city. 

1902 Stratham,* 
Walpole, 
Westmoreland, 

1903 Langdon,t 
Tuf ton borough, 
Winchester,* 
Wolfeboro, 

1904 Allenstown, 
Berlin, 
Charlestown, 
Claremont, 
Lebanon, Town, 
Lebanon, High School, 
Rindge, 

1905 Antrim, 
Derry, Town, 
Derry, Special, 
Enfield,* 

Farmington, Special,* 
Franconia,* 
Greenland, 
Littleton,* 
Milford, 

Milton, 

New London, 

Newport, 

Sunapee,* 

Wakefield, 

Wilton, 

1906 Amherst, 
Boscawen, Special,^ 
Bradford,* 

X United with Penacook as 



Amount paid 
by town. 



Amount 
paid by 
state. 



$360.00 


1360.00 


240.00 


240.00 


75.00 


75.00 


13L24 


131.24 


468.76 


468.76 


150.00 


150.00 


2,200.00 




195.00 


195.00 


780.00 


780.00 


165.00 


165.00 


390.00 


390.00 


135.00 


135.00 


205.00 


205.00 


400.00 


400.00 


75.00 


75.00 


150.00 


150.00 


420.00 


420.00 


300.00 


300.00 


171.00 


171.00 


684.00 


684.00 


300.00 


300.00 


800.00 


300.00 


180.00 


180.00 





one District, 1909. 



150.00 


150.00 


262.50 


262.50 


250.00 


250.00 


125.00 


125.00 


350.00 


350.00 



24 



Amount 
Year of Town or Amount paid paid by 

adoption. city. by town. state. 

1906 Colebrook, Special, 1250.00 1250.00 

Danbury,* 

Hanover, Town,* 

Henniker,* 

1906 Hill, 
Hillsborough, Special, 
Hopkinton, 
Newington, 
Northumberland, 
Orford,* 
Piermont,* 
Rye,* 
Stratford, 
Tilton, Town, 
Warner, 
Warren,* 

1907 Ashland, Special, 
Atkinson, 
Bath, Town, 
Bath, Union, 
Columbia, 
Concord, Town, 
Harrisville,* 
Haverhill, Town, 
Haverhill, Woodsville, 
Holderness, 
Meredith, Town, 
Meredith, Special, 
North Hampton, 
Peterborough, 
Swanzey, 

1908 Campton, 



275.00 


275.00 


150.00 


150.00 


250.00 


250.00 


225.00 


225.00 


162.00 


162.00 


150.00 


150.00 


100.00 


100.00 


225.00 


225.00 


250.00 


250.00 


250.00 


250.00 


250.00 


250.00 


225.00 


225.00 


225.00 


225.00 


225.00 


225.00 


200.00 


200.00 


270.00 


270.00 


233.33 


233.33 


250.00 


250.00 



25 







Amount 


Year of Town or 


Amount paid 


paid by 


a,doption, city. 


by town. 


state. 


1908 Hillsborough, Town, 


fl62.50 


1152.50 


Hinsdale, 


320.83 


320.83 


Jaffrey, 


250.00 


250.00 


Lebanon, West, 


150.00 


150.00 


Northfield, 


125.00 


125.00 


Plainfield, 


150.00 


150.00 


1908 Raymond, 


150.00 


150.00 


Rumney, 


200.00 


200.00 


Tilton, Union, 


250.00 


250.00 


Woodstock, 


150.00 


150.00 


1909 Belmont, 


175.00 


175.00 


Chichester, 


162.50 


162.50 


Colebrook, Town, 


250.00 


260.00 


Conway, 


456.00 


456.00 


Danville, 


150.00 


150.00 


Errol, 


250.00 


250.00 


Loudon, 


162.50 


162.50 


Madison, 


144.00 


144.00 


Ossipee, 


350.00 


350.00 


Tamworth, 


250.00 


250.00 


Windham, 


150.00 


150.00 



* At one time in supervisory union, and subsequently dropped out. 
t At one timejin union, then dropped out, and finally reunited. 



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